Quotes

When you walk into this forest it's a blur of species, yet the
Asháninka people
who accompanied me into the forest had names for almost every plant,
and described uses to about half of all of them.

They had plants that they used as food, building material, medicines,
cosmetics, dyes. They knew plants that accelerated healing of wounds,
cured diarrhea, or cured chronic backache.

Each time the occasion arose I tried these planet remedies on myself only to find that they worked, so I began asking my indigenous consultants how they knew what they knew about plants.

Their answer was enigmatic.

They said, "Knowledge about plants comes from the plants themselves, and ayahuasqueros or tabaqueros, shamans...take Ayahuasca which is a hallucinogenic plant brew, or eat tobacco concentrate and speak in their visions with the essences which are common to all life forms and which are sources of information. Nature is intelligent and speaks to people in visions and dreams."